Lean offers a solid conceptual framework, values and principles, as well
as good practices, derived from experience, that support organizations.
Lean principles:
Lean development can be summarized by seven principles, very close in concept to lean principles:
- Eliminate waste
- Amplify learning
- Decide as late as possible
- Deliver as fast as possible
- Empower the team
- Build integrity in
- See the whole
Opensource systems nowadays are not simply the sum of their parts, but also the product of their interactions. Defects in software tend to accumulate during the development process – by decomposing the big tasks into smaller tasks, and by standardizing different stages of development, the root causes of defects should be found and eliminated. The larger the system, the more organizations that are involved in its development and the more parts are developed by different teams, the greater the importance of having well defined relationships between different vendors, in order to produce a system with smoothly interacting components. During a longer period of development, a stronger subcontractor network is far more beneficial than short-term profit optimizing, which does not enable win-win relationships.
Lean thinking has to be understood well by all members of a project, before implementing in a concrete, real-life situation. "Think big, act small, fail fast; learn rapidly" – these slogans summarize the importance of understanding the field and the suitability of implementing lean principles along the whole software development process. Only when all of the lean principles are implemented together, combined with strong "common sense" with respect to the working environment, is there a basis for success in Opensource development as well as Cyber Security.
